


That Time of Year

by magickfaye (firefliesinlove)



Category: The Sentinel
Genre: Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-24
Updated: 2011-08-24
Packaged: 2017-10-23 01:07:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/244567
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/firefliesinlove/pseuds/magickfaye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Blair is sick and Jim is zoning out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	That Time of Year

**Author's Note:**

> I do not own the rights to The Sentinel, its characters, plot, etc.. I've only written a story here for your enjoyment. :)

Blair woke up to a cool breeze blowing into the loft from an open window. Goosebumps formed all over his skin and he shivered involuntarily. In return, his nerves felt like they were on fire. He shifted slightly under his blankets, only further agitating his nerves and sending waves of pain across his whole body. When he opened his eyes, he was immediately blinded by the glare of the rising sun just out his window and regretted his decision to do so. His alarm clock glared over at him with a flashing time of '12:00AM'. He yawned, fought back tears of exhaustion, and decided that he was probably sick.

It was the time of year when people were more likely to get a cold, the flu, or something else that was just as debilitating and annoying. The University was a breeding ground for all sorts of germs that Blair didn't quite feel like thinking about at the moment. Finals were coming up soon and more people were living on less sleep. Immune systems were being tested all over the place.

Being sick did explain why he had fallen asleep much earlier than he normally did. On any other night he would stay up until all hours of the night. Sometimes he greeted the sunrise before his head would hit the pillow. Other times he wouldn't even get any sleep until the following night. He was used to it. Such was the life of a student, TA and observer at the Cascade PD. Finals, midterms, essays to grade, classes to teach, crime scenes to visit, paperwork to complete... He was lucky if he could fit much else into his very busy schedule. He had no idea how he had managed to fit in a date the previous weekend with a very beautiful woman he had met at a seminar he could not believe he'd had the time to attend the week before that.

 _'Man, I don't have_ time _to be sick.'_ He rolled out of bed, bringing the covers along with him. He walked slowly out of his room and headed into the kitchen where he was greeted by more flashing '12:00's from the digital clocks in the loft. _'Great... just great... The power must've gone out last night while I was sleeping. I wonder if Jim noticed?'_

He stumbled over to the fridge to pull out an algae shake but stopped in his tracks when his stomach turned over and he decided that eating might not be such a great idea after all.

It was then that Blair noticed one of the balcony doors slightly ajar, creaking in the wind. _'Now_ that _Jim should definitely have noticed. I wonder what time it is, anyway?'_

After closing and locking the door he returned to his room and fished his watch out of his backpack. He'd thrown it in there because the ticking had been driving him crazy and had given him a headache. Thinking about that now, maybe it wasn't the watch that had made his head feel as though somebody were constantly hitting it with a bat. That headache was his warning. The throbbing pain had been telling him: " _You're. Over. Doing. It._ " and he had ignored it to the best of his abilities.

"Ah _man_... Five o'clock..." He passed a weary hand over his face and sighed. "Well, since I'm awake..."

Thirty minutes later he was pulling on his jacket and wincing at the very simple movements. His hair was still slightly damp, although it certainly felt as though somebody was holding his head in a bucket of ice water. Everything was amplified ten-fold whenever he came down with something. Quiet sounds gave him a headache; everything he touched made him hurt; lights were too bright; smells were too overpowering and often made him sneeze. This time was no exception. It was times like these when Blair knew how Jim must feel when his senses went into overload. He just wished he could dial everything down. No such luck.

Before putting on his shoes he wrote a short letter to his roommate and left it on the kitchen counter.

  
 _Gone to Rainier to catch up on some work. See you later.  
-Blair_

  
He left shortly after and drove himself to the University where a pile of still unmarked essays was waiting for him in his office.

The morning passed by relatively slowly. Blair managed to finish marking three more essays before he had to go and teach a class. At the end of the lecture he could barely stand up and ended up having to sit down on a chair while some of the students asked him questions about the finals or sparked up some interesting conversations about the topics he had covered or briefly mentioned during the hour and fifteen minutes he had spent teaching. When the last students finally left the lecture hall, he was able to drag himself back to his office and instead of starting on another essay he fell asleep and didn't wake up until his phone started to ring which was roughly twenty-five minutes later.

He only felt worse when he forced his eyes open to look around his desk to find the source of the irritating noise. The sleep hadn't done him any good. He cleared his voice before answering the phone that had been hiding underneath a couple of folders.

"H'lo?"

" _Hey, Chief. Are you busy this afternoon?_ " He pulled the phone away from his ear when the oh-so-familiar voice felt like daggers in his head.

"Uhh..." He searched his brain for his schedule, and a few moments later he realized that, much to his dismay, he wasn't busy. He would much rather go back to the loft and sleep for a zillion or more years. "No. You need help with something?"

" _Yeah, I could use your input on this case we got today. And... Uh... I could use your help with something else, too._ "

"What is it?"

" _I've been having a lot more zone-outs in the past couple of days than I care to admit. I've been trying to keep everything dialed down._ " That explained why Jim probably hadn't noticed the power going out or the door being open. Or even all the noise Blair made when he was getting ready so early in the morning.

"What??? Why haven't you told me before now?"

" _You haven't exactly been available, Chief._ " Blair felt slightly guilty. _'Right. I've been busy at the University.'_ He was supposed to be helping Jim with his Sentinel abilities, but with all of the work he'd been doing at Rainier... Well, he hadn't exactly spent very much time doing anything else. " _Don't worry about it. I understand how busy you are._ "

"What time do you want me to come down?"

" _What time can you get here?_ "

"I can leave now. I'll be there soon."

" _Alright. Later, Chief._ "

"Bye." He hung up the phone and rested his head on his desk for a few minutes in deep thought. He had no idea how he was going to finish grading all of those essays before the end of the week, let alone keep up the studying for the finals that were only a dozen or so days away. Not the way he was feeling. With another sigh, he pulled all of his things together and hurried out to his car, his jacket hanging over his shoulder.

He stuffed the key into the ignition once inside his car, and silently cursed at the amount of time it took for the heat to kick in from the heater. He turned on the car, pulled out of the parking lot and headed down to a building he knew all too well. By the time the air had become warm enough to be considered a comfortable temperature by his current standards, he had arrived at his destination; Cascade PD. He spent a couple of minutes rubbing his hands together and staring at his ghostly pale reflection in the rearview mirror, secretly hoping to himself that nobody would notice or comment on it.

When he walked in through the open doorway of Major Crimes he was greeted by the usual hustle and bustle of the busy department. He nearly toppled over twice on his way to the desk at the back of the room. He found Jim staring down at a pile of papers strewn out over his otherwise clutter-free desk.

"Jim?" When he didn't receive a response after a minute, he dropped his things next to the desk and bent over the desk so he could see Jim's face. He was definitely zoned out. Blair just didn't know on what. "C'mon back to me, buddy."

He shook his shoulders, slapped his face lightly, spoke quietly into his ears and even prodded his friend's shoulder. It was the last not-so-light slap that brought Jim back to the world of the living. He brought a hand up to his face and looked up at Blair.

"I zoned." He said simply. It wasn't a question. He knew what had happened. Blair nodded and pulled a chair up to the desk so he could sit down. There was no way he could stand up for more than a few minutes at a time. Jim didn't need to know that.

"What were you doing this time?"

"I was trying to work on this paperwork, but everybody was being so loud-"

"Then let's get out of here."

"That's a good idea. I haven't had lunch yet, are you hungry?" The thought of food was enough to make Blair feel nauseous. Again, Jim didn't need to know that.

"Let's go." Blair gathered up his things and neither of them spoke until they reached the elevator. "I'll drive."

"I think that might be a good idea, Chief."

Blair couldn't bring himself to nod. It probably wasn't the greatest idea for him to be driving, but at least he wasn't about to zone out on the road and get them both into a car accident.

Once at the car, he unlocked the doors and lowered himself into the passenger side slowly so as not to make the pain any worse. Either Jim didn't notice or decided not to say a word about his slow movements. He was glad.

They drove in almost complete silence all the way to a Chinese food restaurant.

The cold weather hurried them into the restaurant. Blair collapsed onto a chair near the door. Jim sat down across from him at the table, and cocked his head to the side.

"What do you feel like eating?"

"I'm not really hungry. You can go ahead and order something."

"Did you eat something at the University?"

"No. I'm just not hungry, okay?"

"If you say so." Jim glanced at him suspiciously, and then opened up a menu to look through all of the food. When the waitress appeared Blair asked only for water and swallowed at a bitter taste that was forming at the back of his throat. He moved around the seat for a few seconds, trying to get comfortable, but ended up excusing himself from the table and ran all the way to the bathroom.

He fell down to his knees in front of a toilet in the furthest stall from the door, wrapped his arms around his torso and started to rock back and forth. Throwing up was one of the most unpleasant experiences he had to endure in his lifetime. Unpleasant especially when he hadn't had anything to eat beforehand would end up mostly dry heaving. He never looked forward to it but once it was over with he normally felt marginally better than before. But he knew that when he got sick he had to go through it a lot more than just once.

After a few minutes the wave of nausea that had hit him so suddenly passed and he got up to his shaky legs and returned to where Jim sat.

"You look like shit, Sandburg."

"Thanks." Blair smiled weakly, sat down and closed his eyes. "I feel like it."

"Are you okay?" The concern in his partner's voice was apparent.

"Shouldn't I be asking you that question?" He reopened his eyes and noticed the glass of ice water that was sitting in front of him. "So have you noticed anything weird about when you zone out? Does anything in particular stand out? Have you been doing anything different-

"Wait a second, Chief. One question at a time." Jim held up his hand when Blair opened his mouth to say something. "I haven't been doing anything differently, unless you count me letting you drive me around. Nothing strange has happened."

"Have you had a lot on your mind lately?"

"Yeah, as a matter of fact I have."

"I think it could just be that you're thinking too much when you do certain things. Like today, for example, when you zoned in Major Crimes. You said you were working and then started to concentrate a little too much on the noises around you, right?"

"Yeah. That would make sense. But why is it happening now? I always have a lot on my mind."

"There must be something that you're thinking about more than anything else right now. It must be that. Just try to clear your mind every now and again or this could really blow up into something much bigger and much worse than it has to be." Blair paused a moment to catch his breath. Somewhere close by a fork clattered onto a plate, and he winced at the pain it created in his head. He took a sip of water more for show than anything. "You remember those meditation tricks I taught you last week? We'll try some of those today and see if it helps."

"Sounds good." Jim was about to say something else when the waitress came back with a plate full of food that Blair would normally consider to look delicious. At that particular moment, however, he didn't even want to look at it. She set it down in front of Jim, and gave them a small smile before leaving.

"Try not to concentrate on the smell too much, man." Blair's words were more for himself than for Jim. He held the back of his right hand against his mouth, and he frowned as a second wave of nausea chose that moment to pick on him.

"Blair?" Jim had stabbed at a piece of chicken with his fork and was holding it up to his mouth. Blair didn't answer.

Two seconds later he was running to the bathroom again. This time he didn't make it all the way, and ended up throwing up in a garbage can just inside the bathroom. He held the sides of the can to keep himself up as the water he'd just had ended up coming back out the way it went in.

He dry heaved for about a minute, and when he was satisfied that nothing else was going to happen, he dropped down to the floor and leaned against the cool wall. He pressed the side of his face to the wall; it soothed the burning skin of his face. The rest of his body shivered.

"Chief..." Suddenly Jim was kneeling before him, holding a wad of damp toilet paper in his hands.

"This is the epitome of uncool, man." Blair closed his eyes and let out a shaky sigh. "I'm sorry, Jim. I'm not helping, am I?"

"Don't say that. You helped out a lot." Jim reached out and pressed the toilet paper to Blair's cheeks and forehead. "You're right. There has been a lot more on my mind lately."

Jim threw the toilet paper into the garbage and returned his full attention to his guide.

"I really am sorry, man."

"There's nothing to be sorry about. Come on." Jim grabbed hold of Blair's shoulders and hoisted him up to his feet. "Let's forget the food and get you back home."

"You really shouldn't be driving, man."

"I'll be fine. It's you I'm more concerned about."

"But what if you zone-"

"I won't. I'll clear my mind. That's what you said to do, right? So that's what I'll do now."

Jim didn't like driving Blair's car but he kept his mouth shut on the way home and instead concentrated on driving the car. Blair wouldn't have noticed even if he had said something because he had fallen asleep.

He practically had to carry Blair up to the loft once they arrived. Exhaustion had finally hit him with full force and he barely managed to keep his eyes open let alone keep both of his feet going one in front of the other.

"You're really something, Chief, you know that?"

"Mmhmmm."

They took the elevator up to the third floor. Blair leaned heavily on Jim. He didn't mind in the slightest.

"Next time you're sick just stay in bed. I'm sure the world can manage without you for a day or two."

"Mmhmm."

"You need to get more sleep." He didn't think that Blair was even listening anymore.

"Mmhmm."

"There's nothing in the world like a nice, big, juicy burger from Wonder Burger."

"Mmhmm."

Jim grinned. Blair was definitely not listening. He led his sick and sleepy guide into his room on the main floor and under the covers in his bed. He went into the kitchen to find some medication to ease Blair's stomach and a glass of water and by the time he got back to Blair's room, he was fast asleep.

He set down the bottle of pills and glass of water on the table next to his partner and tucked in the sheets around his shivering body.

"Sleep well, Chief."


End file.
